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German science

The German portal academics has a rather long narrative about the failure of German science – and an excerpt from “Richard Münch, Die akademische Elite. Zur sozialen Konstruktion wissenschaftlicher Exzellenz, Frankfurt a.M.: Edition Suhrkamp, 2007”.

This reads in my translation

When you have finally reached at the age of 40 the independence of being now a professor, you have already lost it again. From now on you are one of the VIPs who have to work in a factory, that dictates every day the next step what to do: meet everytime with colleagues – also those that you would like to avoid – plan the next joint project, administer, go for internal or extramural proof or even let it evaluate, manage work shops, invite and host guests, write reports and announce activities in the public. Even if you free yourself from this internal machinery, there is an external machinery of reviewing, accrediting or working in commissions. Work in the old system – always at disposal of a professor – has been detached by the avalanche of grant application, report and public relation management. Being a late professor you will learn in your desired new role that you have lost all freedom of doing research.

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